Early History

Only one manor upon Wealden clay was mentioned in the Domesday survey of 1086 and that was Ockley. The name is also thought to be derived from the Saxon word Hoclei which probably means Ocka’s clearing. Before William the Conqueror, the land was held by Almar for Edward the Confessor.

Then in 1250 Ockley was held by Alice de Dammartin in honour of the de Clare family in Suffolk who owned numerous estates. By 1300 the Dammartins had made an undergrant to Nicholas Malmeyn who was granted the court baron and Leet two years later by Edward I. Slightly earlier however in 1293 the King had presented an advowson to the manor on behalf of Malmeyn — his ward.

Except for St. Margarets church, structures of contemporary date are no longer evident but medieval buildings surely existed and one of these must have been the Manor and Court house of Malmeyn. The very early exercise of public jurisdiction was executed by the courts baron, which comprised an assembly of manor tenants under the lord. Although from the c16 the manorial courts were beginning to decay, the courts baron along with their officers were being replaced by the vestry at various times until well into the c19 when in 1894 the Local Government Act finally secularised parish administration.

Sir William de Hoo was presented to the living followed by John de Newdigate, Stephen Speleman, Amicia Newdigate and Thomas de Hoo, after which the Manor was owned in 1450 by a certain Richard Wakehurst whose grand-daughter married Nicholas Culpeper, the herbalist and son of the Rector.

Throughout the Tudor period and just before, Ockley Manor was owned by the Culpepers from whom it was bought by the Duncombes of Albury who conveyed the Manor in 1694 without the advowson to one Edward Bax, a Quaker. Incidentally thirty years afterwards the Blythe Trust purchased the £900 advowson for Clare Hall (later of Cambridge).

After Bax came John Evershed in 1695 (Sheriff of Surrey in 1712) followed in 1717 by John Young and the Moore family, then Frederick North who so encumbered with debt disposed of Ockley to Dr. Frank Nicholls a celebrated anatomist. Nicholls’s son sold the Manor in 1795 to the Lee-Steeres of Jayes who still have possession.

The village centre is now a Conservation area within the Town & Country Act 1971 and the Town & Country Amenities Act 1974.

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